Turkey & Nuclear Weapons

[Webstral]

I can’t remember if this has come up before, but while re-reading the v1 chronology I was struck yet again by the fact that the US really leaves the Turks hanging in the nuclear exchange. The whole point of joining NATO is to get under the US nuclear umbrella, right? And yet the v1 chronology clearly states that a one-sided use of tactical nuclear weapons on the part of the Pact forces breaks the stalemate in Thrace. This is not a positive statement about the worthiness of the US as allies.

It looks like we also leave the Romanians in the lurch, too. There is no direct reference to a one-sided use of nuclear weapons, but the Romanian Army collapsed in part due to limited nuclear use. I can’t say for certain that the US failed to provide any balancing strikes. However, we clearly left the Turks to hang on their own.

[Olefin]

That is one area where the canon did leave a hole - but I think the US eventually did hit them back. The way it reads after the strikes the Bulgarians had a wide open path into European Turkey - but then in 2000 according to the NATO book the Turks still have Istanbul. So what stopped the Bulgarians - most likely US nuke strikes that arent told in the canon. Possibly a line got dropped in editing the original story about how US nuke strikes stopped the Bulgarians and Greeks cold but by then the Turks had been hit so bad that any chance of them coming to the support again of the Romanians was finished?

[Targan]

Boy did I misunderstand the title of this thread before I opened the first post. I was thinking "Wow, serious overkill, I'd just use a shotgun".

[HorseSoldier]

Even with US backing by the nuke exchange, Turkey's protection may have been limited by geography, with Italy and Greece now out. Books aren't handy, but the US Navy in the Med was badly chewed up by then. With an exchange in central Europe and the Middle East, Turkey may have been left in the breeze during the tactical weapon exchange, but back stopped when strategic weapons get employed.

[Matt Wiser]

Remember the nukes at Incirlik? Those bombs were meant not only for the USAF, but also for the Turks under the dual-key system. At least one Turkish AF unit (F-16s in T2K, but they flew F-104s and F-100s earlier) was certified to carry the weapons. And until the Turks retired the Honest John in the mid '80s, there were warheads kept in U.S. custody to be released to the Turks if/when the time came.

There's a story/factfile on Chico's site about a USAF Tactical Missile Wing that was kicked out of Sicily when the Italians left NATO, and they wound up in Turkey instead. 487th TMW, if memory serves.

[Webstral]

So we have a choice between claiming that the v1 chronology has a gap regarding Turkey and the nuclear phase or finding and explanation for why nukes at Incirlik didn’t get involved.

[pmulcahy11b]

Originally Posted by Targan

Boy did I misunderstand the title of this thread before I opened the first post. I was thinking "Wow, serious overkill, I'd just use a shotgun".

+1!

[Olefin]

Frankly I think the authors missed the fact that the Turks had access to nukes. The whole situation in the Balkans isnt really handled that well in the timeline - for instance how did the CivGov forces get to Yugoslavia in the first place past not only MilGov but also the French patrols at Gibraltar, let alone the Italians and Greeks? And considering the areas they hold where did they even get ships and fuel for such an operation (all they have on the East Coast really is the enclave in the Carolinas - so how did they get a NY NG unit shipped out from there)?

You have the Turks getting nuked and the Bulgarians racing for Istanbul - and then the timeline goes silent. Whats funny is that you can tell the GDW writers themselves didnt know what to do with the Turks - because the NATO guides are full of "what the Turkish units did wasnt really known during the war" - i.e. they just sort of threw them in there and didnt know what to really do with them.

Sort of how Ploesti mysteriously doesnt get nuked out of existence when the US, who lost a lot of men bombing the place in WWII, would have made sure that the place was a huge molten crater for sure in real life. The Balkans are just sort of a big afterthought since their real focus was Poland in the initial releases and they probably never thought any player groups would head that way.

[WallShadow]

Originally Posted by Targan

Boy did I misunderstand the title of this thread before I opened the first post. I was thinking "Wow, serious overkill, I'd just use a shotgun".

Uhh, couldn't we try the OVEN first????

[bobcat]

oh come on we all know aiming tactical nukes at a turkey is the traditional way to celebrate thanksgiving.

and yeah the timeline does leave everyone outside poland kinda hanging.

[Legbreaker]

Originally Posted by Olefin

Frankly I think the authors missed the fact that the Turks had access to nukes.

Access doesn't mean ability to use. The US still controlled the codes, etc and may have deliberately withheld them because of the wider strategic/global situation.

[Olefin]

once the nukes started to fly I doubt the US would have hidden the codes still from the Turks

by the way there is one very likely explanation for why the Turkish nukes never got used- maybe they got taken out by the Soviets either with a conventional raid, a nuclear one or Special Forces before they hit the Turkish army itself with nukes

Could explain why the Turks couldnt respond - because they had nothing left to respond with

[Targan]

Originally Posted by Olefin

by the way there is one very likely explanation for why the Turkish nukes never got used- maybe they got taken out by the Soviets either with a conventional raid, a nuclear one or Special Forces before they hit the Turkish army itself with nukes

Could explain why the Turks couldnt respond - because they had nothing left to respond with

Does anyone know what the protocols are for US nukes stationed in foreign countries such as Turkey? In times of war would all the warheads in such a country be kept in one place or dispersed?

[Matt Wiser]

This is only a guess, but I'd bet that the warheads (artillery shells-the Honest John warheads would've been long gone-and gravity bombs) would remain in their storage areas-and none of them were in European Turkey. AF and Army personnel guarded the storage sites, and would release them only upon receiving the appropriate release orders. Once the warheads are released, they can be used. The relevant NATO air command was 6th Allied Tactical Air Force, and once the gravity bombs are released, 6th ATAF would designate the targets. Artillery shells, though, would be used probably by Corps Commanders (the likely warheads are the 8-inch AFAP rounds for the M-110 howitzer). Once the Turks asked for release of the bombs and artillery shells, it goes up the line to SACEUR, then the President, who has to consent to release American weapons. Once release is granted, it goes back down the chain of command.

The bombs at Incirlik-along with the GLCMs of the 487th TMW-would be used by the USAF, though.

[Olefin]

So an attack on the storage sites - which of course the KGB knew exactly where they were - could have taken out the nukes allocated to the Turks before they ever had a chance to get them out of the bunkers. Especially if they had compromised US or NATO communications and got a heads up for the release request and hit them before the President could respond.

[bobcat]

Originally Posted by Olefin

So an attack on the storage sites - which of course the KGB knew exactly where they were - could have taken out the nukes allocated to the Turks before they ever had a chance to get them out of the bunkers. Especially if they had compromised US or NATO communications and got a heads up for the release request and hit them before the President could respond.

that right there is a good plausible reason for turkey falling out from under the nuclear umbrella. hell with foreknowledge of where the bunkers are located it could even be done with conventional bunker busters.

[James1978]

Originally Posted by Olefin

So an attack on the storage sites - which of course the KGB knew exactly where they were - could have taken out the nukes allocated to the Turks before they ever had a chance to get them out of the bunkers. Especially if they had compromised US or NATO communications and got a heads up for the release request and hit them before the President could respond.

In the case of the gravity bombs, taking out the storage site might not do the job. Toward the end of the Cold War, NATO was starting to move away from keeping the gravity bombs in central storage areas and toward storage in vaults built into the floors of individual HAS. The idea was to shorten the reaction/load time by eliminating the weapons convoys from the WSA to the individual HAS/QRA pad.

Which isn't to say that you can't take out each individual HAS, but they are often more numerous and more spread out than storage igloos. And I believe it would require simultaneously hitting at least five Turkish air bases.

All the above assumes a conventional attack. If we're talking nukes, well that's different.

[The Rifleman]

When I first saw this title, I actually thought it was about the Soviet surprise nuclear attack on Thanksgiving, 1997, thus "turkey and nuclear weapons".... it actually got me thinking quite abit about that topic. Really, why???? What could they possibly gain? I know its off topic, but just the title got me curious.

[Legbreaker]

But was it really all that much of a surprise? I mean really, isn't it just the logical next step in escalation of the war?
The only surprise may have been in the timing of it (but even that makes sense when you consider many of the emergency services people would have been out of position on holiday with their families).

[The Rifleman]

Originally Posted by Legbreaker

But was it really all that much of a surprise? I mean really, isn't it just the logical next step in escalation of the war?
The only surprise may have been in the timing of it (but even that makes sense when you consider many of the emergency services people would have been out of position on holiday with their families).

Well yes, your right, I think that everyone knew that sooner or later, it would happen. But as both sides were gently toeing the line, it was a big step. The story line in the opening books don't give the T-day attack justice. In the modules, it fills in a lot better. If I were the US getting hammered all at once, on a holiday, like they were, I probably would have thought it was the big one.

After all, if all they were after were just production centers, what difference would it make if you hit them a week apart?

[Olefin]

Thanksgiving is the biggest travel holiday in the US - so it is a day when a lot of people are visiting family, out of town and not where they normally should be - including a lot of first responders. That would add to the disruption of the attack - i.e. you have the chaos of the attacks and of literally millions of people trying to get home afterward adding to that chaos. And other holidays would add a lot of symbolism to the attack that could make people want revenge even more - i..e Fourth of July or Christmas Day would really be bad ideas for attacks as that would only inflame US desire to hit back and pay them back even more.

And actually hitting on Thanksgiving Day would have also lessened the US civilian casualties - i.e. a lot of people were not at their jobs at the industrial centers that were hit, instead they were at home or grandmas's or wherever celebrating the holiday. And the attacks really werent going for a lot of civilian deaths as their main modus operandi - if they were then the NY attacks would have been on Manhattan Island and Queens and Brooklyn, not the oil refineries.

[The Rifleman]

Originally Posted by Olefin

Thanksgiving is the biggest travel holiday in the US - so it is a day when a lot of people are visiting family, out of town and not where they normally should be - including a lot of first responders. That would add to the disruption of the attack - i.e. you have the chaos of the attacks and of literally millions of people trying to get home afterward adding to that chaos. And other holidays would add a lot of symbolism to the attack that could make people want revenge even more - i..e Fourth of July or Christmas Day would really be bad ideas for attacks as that would only inflame US desire to hit back and pay them back even more.

And actually hitting on Thanksgiving Day would have also lessened the US civilian casualties - i.e. a lot of people were not at their jobs at the industrial centers that were hit, instead they were at home or grandmas's or wherever celebrating the holiday. And the attacks really werent going for a lot of civilian deaths as their main modus operandi - if they were then the NY attacks would have been on Manhattan Island and Queens and Brooklyn, not the oil refineries.

There are some really good points in that. The deaths probably were lower. But where I'm going with this is that all the missle silo operators were on duty. Wouldn't hitting all these major cities at once cause the US leadership to say, oh, crap, they are going for broke, launch them all NOW.

[Legbreaker]

From the three "official" timelines (V1, V2.0, & 2.2):

NATO's theater nuclear missiles were launched against an array of industrial targets and port cities in the western Soviet Union. Throughout October the exchanges continued, escalating gradually. Fearful of a general strategic exchange, neither side targeted on the land-based ICBM's of the other, or launched so many warheads at once as to risk convincing the other side that an all-out attack was in progress. Neither side wished to cross the threshold to nuclear oblivion in one bold step, and so they inched across it, never quite knowing they had done it until after the fact.
First, military targets were hit. Then industrial targets clearly vital to the war effort. Then economic targets of military importance. Then transportation and communication, oil fields and refineries. Then major industrial and oil centres in neutral nations, to prevent their possible use by the other side. Numerous warheads were aimed at logistical stockpiles and command control centres of the armies in the field. Almost accidentally, the civilian political command structure was first decimated, then eliminated. The exchange continued, fitfully and irregularly, through November and early December, and then gradually petered out.

From Howling Wilderness:

In Late November, data from various sources indicated an attack might again be imminent. Congress declared an early recess (ostensibly for the Thanksgiving holiday, but this fooled no one). The teams were sent out once again, and even though some provision was made for families of team members, less than half of the required personnel showed up for duty. Everyone, from the President on down, seemed to think the whole thing was another false alarm.
The day after Thanksgiving, an orbiting military surveillance satellite picked up a number of IR signatures, characteristic of the launch of SLBMs. Within minutes, messages were zipping through established channels and alarms began ringing across the nation.

It seems clear the strikes against continental US occurred at the tail end of the 1997 nuclear attacks. Everyone had probably gotten very used to reports of "yet another nuke somewhere not here" and become quite blasé about the whole thing (those not on the receiving end of them at least).
With an established policy of one warhead in retaliation for another, a few dozen missiles fired at the US would not have been enough to prompt a massive response.
We also know from the above quotes that there wasn't all that much of a civilian command structure left at this time. While in Europe the destruction was undoubtedly a direct result of conventional or nuclear weapons, in the US riots and general panic coupled by the draining of manpower for the front lines would have had a similar effect. With government and supporting organisations stripped in this way, a handful of nukes aimed at strategic locations would probably have been enough to at least time what survived over the edge and beyond recovery.

Note also that the attack didn't happen until the day after Thanksgiving, and it wasn't the first time longer range nukes had been used, it was just the first time that we know of nukes being used against the US homeland.

[Panther Al]

Originally Posted by Legbreaker

From the three "official" timelines (V1, V2.0, & 2.2):
From Howling Wilderness:
It seems clear the strikes against continental US occurred at the tail end of the 1997 nuclear attacks. Everyone had probably gotten very used to reports of "yet another nuke somewhere not here" and become quite blasé about the whole thing (those not on the receiving end of them at least).
With an established policy of one warhead in retaliation for another, a few dozen missiles fired at the US would not have been enough to prompt a massive response.
We also know from the above quotes that there wasn't all that much of a civilian command structure left at this time. While in Europe the destruction was undoubtedly a direct result of conventional or nuclear weapons, in the US riots and general panic coupled by the draining of manpower for the front lines would have had a similar effect. With government and supporting organisations stripped in this way, a handful of nukes aimed at strategic locations would probably have been enough to at least time what survived over the edge and beyond recovery.

Note also that the attack didn't happen until the day after Thanksgiving, and it wasn't the first time longer range nukes had been used, it was just the first time that we know of nukes being used against the US homeland.

Not sure how well you know of Thanksgiving over here leg, but it's not, despite what the calendars say, a one day holiday. It always falls on a Thursday, and because of that, Friday is always taken off along with it to make for a long weekend. So for all intents and purposes, its a four day holiday - with Friday being the most dead to the world day of the bunch.

[Legbreaker]

Well then, perhaps it didn't happen during the holiday at all...

The day after Thanksgiving, an orbiting military surveillance satellite picked up a number of IR signatures, characteristic of the launch of SLBMs.

Perhaps it caught most people on the move back to their homes and jobs, away from their hoarded supplies, emergency weapons and carefully laid out disaster reaction plans. http://forum.juhlin.com/showthread.php?t=3558

[Targan]

Originally Posted by Panther Al

Not sure how well you know of Thanksgiving over here leg, but it's not, despite what the calendars say, a one day holiday. It always falls on a Thursday, and because of that, Friday is always taken off along with it to make for a long weekend. So for all intents and purposes, its a four day holiday - with Friday being the most dead to the world day of the bunch.

I didn't know for sure until this post, but I'd always assumed that the Thanksgiving Day holiday would be a long weekend. That's how most of our public holidays work here.

[Bullet Magnet]

Originally Posted by Panther Al

Not sure how well you know of Thanksgiving over here leg, but it's not, despite what the calendars say, a one day holiday. It always falls on a Thursday, and because of that, Friday is always taken off along with it to make for a long weekend. So for all intents and purposes, its a four day holiday - with Friday being the most dead to the world day of the bunch.

And don't forget, it's also Black Friday. If the Soviets wanted to reduce the civilian population by 50% or more on this day, they'd target the malls.

[Olefin]

Where it caught them was at Grandma's or their cousins or their parents place - i.e. wherever they had traveled for the holiday. So now you have a huge fraction of the US population - perhaps as high as 25 percent or more - not at home, possibly several hundred miles away, all trying to get home after a nuclear attack, many of them with fried electrical systems in their cars preventing them from starting.

Or caught out on the road, either shopping or going back home and in monumental traffic jams caused by the strikes.

In our game when we did Allegheny Uprising we found a huge traffic jam of nuked cars sitting on the 81 west of Harrisburg that got nuked when the Soviets took out the Army War College with a 100kt nuke as part of the Massacre.

[Jason Weiser]

Or the exact opposite. Everybody's expecting a strike. I mean everybody. People are like a coiled spring, so they're doing what the Pembertons did in HW?

"Marsha dear, let's have our folks out here. It's better than them being downtown with all that's happening with the constant alerts. And just in case things get real bad, let's send the kids on a trip with Jim and his kids, they're all friends and he has a fishing cabin. We'll have dinner early."

A lot of families in the suburbs may have simply decided staying home to make sure they had those supplies would be a very good idea.

[The Rifleman]

Originally Posted by Jason Weiser

Or the exact opposite. Everybody's expecting a strike. I mean everybody. People are like a coiled spring, so they're doing what the Pembertons did in HW?

"Marsha dear, let's have our folks out here. It's better than them being downtown with all that's happening with the constant alerts. And just in case things get real bad, let's send the kids on a trip with Jim and his kids, they're all friends and he has a fishing cabin. We'll have dinner early."

A lot of families in the suburbs may have simply decided staying home to make sure they had those supplies would be a very good idea.

It isn't the exact opposite. They weren't suspecting a thing. Even President Tanner got nailed.... I think perhaps a few smart families thought otherwise, but overall, its been since the war of 1812 a foriegn power hit the mainland....